É habitual a classificação de grupos etários (Boomers, Gamers, Geração X, Geração Y, nativos digitais, etc), consoante o período em que os indivíduos desses grupos nasceram e a forma como a sociedade e os acontecimentos verificados no mundo durante a sua infância e juventude os influenciaram. Os efeitos da evolução tecnológica influem  também nesta classificação em gerações culturais. São habituais as referências a estas gerações nas publicações na área da educação, em particular no que diz respeito ao uso das TIC no ensino. Esta organização do conhecimento histórico, e a sua análise sociológica,  feita sob o conceito de geração, é habitual em países como os Estados Unidos. A classificação da  tabela acima organiza os grupos etários de acordo com contextos históricos relevantes neste país embora o fenómeno da globalização leve a que para as gerações mais recentes existam, à escala mundial, poucas diferenças culturais ou geográficas. A geração que se seguirá à actual, a geração Z, ainda não tem uma designação definida embora se aponte como hipótese a designação Generation Alpha (ou Generation A). Esta será a primeira geração constituída apenas por indivíduos nascidos no século XXI. Para designar esta geração, nascida a partir da década de 2010, são também propostos os nomes de Generation T (T de tablet) ou Generation App, (ver 'Generation Y' is Dead, Long Live 'Generation T'), realçando a importância dos novos equipamentos móveis com formas de interacção baseadas em gestos naturais. 

A software product tutorial essentially helps users work with the features of the product. So it is mandatory that tutorials have concise and precise tasks and steps to work with the product. Most importantly software product tutorials must be help users achieve something by using the product. Things you must do before you begin ·     Explore the product and its features thoroughly ·     Try working with the product features yourself     When you must start writing product tutorials ·     When you know everything that you need to know about the product ·     When you understand and know the product and why users must use the product ·     When you are very sure of the features, the tasks that you can do with the features and the steps for each of the     tasks   Quick  Tips to Create Software Product Tutorials Create end to end software product tutorials.For example here is a tutorial that teaches you to create realistic water reflection using Photoshop. As you can see this tutorial helps you achieve something using Photoshop and that is why this tutorial is an end to end tutorial.  Tip 2 Always start with a brief description about the feature and add details such as why users must use the feature. For example in this tutorial on MS Word, there is a short audio text which mentions how the track changes feature is useful when you revise and make changes to a document and when that document has to be used by many others.  Tip 3 List what you are going to cover in the tutorial at the outset. This must cover all the tasks that one can do with the product feature. For example in this tutorial on MS Word, all the tasks that one can do using the Track Changes feature have been listed as learning objectives in the first page.  Tip 4 Disclose the end result of the tutorial. For example in this tutorial that helps you create your first PowerPoint presentation, it will be a good idea to show a complete presentation at the outset and guide the learners to create that specific presentation. This way the users would find the tutorial object oriented.  A good example is this photoshop tutorial which shows you in the begninning the photo effect you can create following the steps in the tutorial.  So the user is very clear about what he/she is going to achieve by taking the tutorial.  Tip 5 List the tasks in a logical order. The sequence of tasks must lead users to the end result. For example the logical order of some of the the tasks to create a PowerPoint presentation are: Create a New Slide Change the Layout of  the Slide Add Text Add Images Insert Slide Notes Add Animations Here the order of the tasks are very important. Tip 6 Write precise instructions. For example Click on the word and choose Copy from the context menu is not a precise instruction. What the writer meant was Select the word, right-click and choose Copy from the context menu.  Tip 7  Make sure you write the button or tab names exactly the way it appears in the product. I have spent hours searching for buttons and tabs suggested by tutorials and which I could not find in the product. Tip 8 Make sure you write the steps for each task logically and correctly. For example to the steps to create a new presentation in PowerPoint are: Select File -> New from the Main Menu. In the New Presentation Task Pane , choose Blank Presentation. Tip 9 After you write the tutorial, follow the instructions you have written and execute the tutorial. This will help you identify the errors.

E-learning Tyro has just launched his new site E-learning Planet where he is not only going to share useful information but also facilitate: Free online assignments for budding Instructional Designers Contests for Instructional Designers and Graphic Designers Do check out E-learning Planet!

Oportunidades para o E-learning no Contexto da Web 2.0 Este artigo - Oportunidades para o E-learning no Contexto da Web 2.0 - foi publicado no nº 17 da revista Politécnica (Dezembro de 2010) editada pelo Instituto Superior Politécnico Gaya. O nº 17 ainda não está on-line mas fica aqui o link para o artigo completo (no Scribd) e o resumo: Este artigo aborda o posicionamento dos sistemas de e-learning face ao recente desenvolvimento das redes sociais e da Web 2.0. É apresentada uma perspectiva histórica do e-learning, desde os primeiros cursos à distância até ao ensino apoiado nas tecnologias de informação e comunicação. As tendências impostas pela Web 2.0 e pelo uso de tecnologias na sociedade em geral são analisadas tendo em vista a sua aplicação ao ensino. São apresentadas as implicações do uso dessas ferramentas e a forma como estão já a ser aplicadas no que é designado por e-learning 2.0. É discutido o significado actual do conceito de e-learning e as oportunidades das sua aplicação à realidade actual do ensino. Partes deste artigo, que foi escrito há cerca de um ano, foram também já publicadas neste blogue.

Has it happened with you that you saw a movie and wondered how the director visualized the  amazing scenes? Has it also happened that you checked out an e-learning course and wondered how the Instructional Designer thought of the visuals, animations and interactivities? Well, it has happened with me an umpteen number of times. I just keep thinking what gets into people’s heads that they think so creatively. Designing E-learning course just like movie making requires lot of creativity and innovation. An Instructional Designer has to visualize every screen of an e-learning course and get the graphic designers and programmers in the team to implement it exactly the way he/she visualized. Doesn’t this remind you of a movie director, who visualizes every scene of a movie and gets his actors to enact it exactly the way he visualized?  The Instructional Designer has to work with the available content,  strategize and present the content in such a way that it appears new and interests the learners. The movie director has to work with common themes and strategize to present the theme in such a fashion that it appears new and interesting to the audience. Now both the Instructional Designer and the movie director have to be really good at visualizing. This is critical both to the movie and the e-learning course. What do you think a movie director does to improve his visualization skills? Watch a lot of movies, read novels, etc. Now what do Instructional Designers to do work on their visualization skills? Check out other e-learning courses and what else?  Apart from checking out and analyzing e-learning courses, an Instructional Designer must also play a lot of games. Most people think playing games is a waste of time. But then it is not true for an Instructional Designer at least. Just as in a game, visuals and interactivities are crucial to an e-learning course too. So here I list the three reasons why Instructional Designers should play games Three Reasons Why Instructional Designers Should Play Games Reason 1: Games have loads of visual strategies I seriously believe games give you lot of visual strategies much more than any other sources. If you keep playing games, you get an opportunity to see different visual designs and then when you get to design e-learning courses you can use similar ideas. For example the other day I had gone to Subway and I really hated the sandwich the chef out there made. I thought he was not trained. He did not know the combination of sauces that would make the sandwich taste good. And then I thought of  this as a business case for e-learning. Suppose Subway management decides to go for an e-learning course for all chefs in Subway. Let’s say the management wants something visually appealing, something interactive and engaging. I could just visualize the following: Virtual customers, virtual kitchen and virtual ingredients. Customers order a customized sandwich. The waiters drag and drop the ingredients on the sandwich in the right combination depending on customer requirements. For every correct sandwich they gain points. For every wrong sandwich they lose points. The waiters’ objective is to gain maximum points by making right sandwiches. If it is a low budget course, you can use just images and simple animations. If budget is not a constraint, this can be a simulation. Now this strategy is inspired by games as follows: You could use this strategy when learners have to learn something by rote. The bottom line is to identify good strategies while playing games and use in e-learning. Reason 2: Games show ways in which you can encourage audience participation Most games require mouse clicks or pressing arrow keys. But then it doesn’t get monotonous because the context and objective of the game is different every time. In the given context the whole act of clicking and pressing gets very interesting and exciting. When you play games you get to know how to use existing interactivity models in different contexts and for different purposes. For example in the game called Dreams, you simply click to find the differences between the two images as shown below: The interactivity model used above  is simple and basic, yet the objective and context of the game makes the play interesting. Likewise in the game below, you just have to mouse over the faces that show up. The challenge of the game is to mouse over maximum faces that show up within a time limit. As you start playing the game you get addicted to it. The bottom line is when you play games you get to know how to innovate on existing interactivity models. Reason 3: Games show ways in which you can engage the audience People love playing games and they get so engrossed that they forget time. Games can just engage anyone and everyone. So what is it in a game that engages people? The answer is simple. It is the challenge in the game that engages audience. People want to badly reach the objective of the game and this sustains their interest. I guess e-learning courses must also have this element of challenge which will engage the learners during the learning process and games will give you ideas on how to make your e-learning courses challenging. With this I end my post here and leave it open for discussion Please check out some online games here and let me know what you think: Miniclip Kongregate Big Fish Games

Soon after I wrote the post: Why Instructional Designers Should Play Games? , I got a query from one reader asking  how game based strategies will work when there is a budget constraint for an e-learning course. I guess you do not have to have 3D animations or advanced gaming strategies to make your e-learning course engaging. You can use simple interactivity models, simple graphics and yet make the course engaging. I recently played this game called Wizard of Symbol. The game has basic interactivity models that you use in e-learning too. The game does not use high level graphic design. Yet it is interesting to play the game. The game happens in a wizard book. You flip the book to progress. The objective of the game is to uncover all the secret symbols from the secret book. To uncover each symbol you need to just hold and drag the mouse across the number in a chronological order. If you stop in between it gets counted as a mistake and you get to resume from the point you stopped. Once you run though all the numbers, the symbol and the details about the symbol gets unravelled. For example here is the first challenge in the game: I just clicked and dragged the mouse  through all the numbers in a chronological order. The result was as follows: The symbol got unravelled as follows: Then the details of the symbol appeared as follows: Now can you not use this strategy for e-learning too? Think about it. Will this strategy not work when you have to teach facts? For example if you have to teach some botanical names of plants, don’t you think you could use the interactivity model used in this game? You can tweak the interactivity model used in the game to suit the budget constraints for your e-learning. This strategy also works well when you want to evoke curiosity in the learners. Now what do you think about this? Please let me know.

Saiu o nº 25 da E-Learning Papers, Game-based Learning: new pratices, new classrooms. Os artigos publicados estão disponíveis para download.

I have heard of teachers who teach science concepts by telling stories using pictures, cartoons and multimedia. Teachers tell stories because kids like stories and they learn faster. Not only kids, adults also like stories. We understand better through stories and storytelling. The other day I was working on a short e-learning prototype. I thought of some strategies and then I quickly outlined the slides of the e-learning in a PowerPoint. I thought I had done a good job.  Later my friend suggested that I narrate the strategy I used in the e-learning prototype. We  continued to discuss and then we took turns to narrate each slide of my prototype.  To my surprise I found a couple of logical pitfalls. I discovered that I start with a story , go on and on, the story breaks in between for sometime and then the story ends. I didn’t discover this when I designed each slide of the prototype. Well, story telling is an excellent exercise in Instructional Designing, in the sense that it tells you how logical and effective your prospective e-learning course is. Have you ever tried narrating your Storyboard to someone? This is similar to what a movie director does. A movie director always narrates the plot to the actors. The actors can very well read the movie script themselves. But then most movie directors make it a point to narrate their script because this is how the movie comes alive even before the actual work begins. Here is what Prof Karl Kapp suggests to help Instructional Designers to become story tellers: Here is one idea, have the designer create a lesson entirely in pictures using PowerPoint or some other slide media and force them to "tell the story" to an audience complete with characters, plot and setting-no words on the slides…none. It really forces the analytical side of a designer over to the "story telling side" and requires some real thinking about stories and e-learning. I think all Instructional Designers must be good storytellers because:   Instructional Designers are supposed to be Creative The E-learning courses they design must engage the audience Do you think Instructional Designers must be good story tellers? Please write in your views in the comments section.

This forum is for the benefit of all people who want to start a career in Instructional Designing or shift jobs during this time of recession. As far as I know and have heard the recession is not affecting Instructional Designers much. In November 2008, Prof Karl Kapp cites an article that shows that e-learning is right up and he also concludes his article saying "In this economy with large corporations laying off employees, you may want to consider designing e-learning for small companies (if you are a content developer.) So what do you have to say? Are companies hiring Instructional Designers? Are companies hiring freshers who want to start their career in Instructional Designing? Are freelance jobs more available than regular jobs? How is the e-learning industry doing? Please feel free to add more information. You can do any of the following: Post links to articles containing factual information about how recession is affecting Instructional Designers Share information you have heard about recession in e-learning industry Inform if you know of any friend who has got a job as an Instructional Designer in recent times Please post the information in the comments section.

Algumas sugestões para usar o iPad na sala de aula (partilhado por @web20classroom, http://web20classroom.blogspot.com/) 62 Interesting Ways to use an iPad in the  Classroom Ver também: Is the iPad The Future of Textbooks iPad no Ensino m-learning e o iPad

by ruparajgo | Create your own Cartoon at www.toondoo.com I am so glad that I have completed 2 successful years of blogging. I never thought I would come this far. I should say I have learnt a lot about Instructional Designing from the time I started blogging. I am glad I am a better Instructional Designer today and I wish I get better and better in the coming days. In these 2 years I have become a part of the e-learning blog network both in India and across the globe. I have discovered really good blogs on Instructional Designing. I have interacted and shared information with fellow bloggers. It has really been an amazing learning experience  and I hope this continues for a long time. Thanks to Manish Mohan , Satish Narayanan, Cammy Bean, Christy Tucker, Janet Clarey, Prof Karl Kapp, Cathy Moore, Tom Kuhlmann, Dave Ferguson , Ken Allen and many more who have  inspired me to write more. Thanks to all the visitors of this blog. Thanks to all those who take time to pen comments. This blog now has 137 posts on Instructional Designing especially useful for freshers. Freshers can check out the archives and read the posts in a chronological order from Feb 2007. Recently I have been busy, so I havent been writing so regularly. I hope to write regularly from now on. Please keep visiting my blog and looking forwading to interacting with all of you. Cheers, Rupa

O Projecto 110 Stories, promovido por Brian August, um nova-iorquino, teve como resultado o desenvolvimento de uma aplicação gratuita (para iPhone e Android) de realidade aumentada que permite visualizar a silhueta das Twin Towers no lugar que ocupariam na paisagem de Nova Iorque. O utilizador pode tirar uma fotografia da paisagem urbana da cidade aumentada com as silhuetas das torres. Para além da fotografia, pode partilhar uma história sobre os acontecimentos de 11 de Setembro de 2001. A aplicação funciona num raio de 40 milhas do Ground Zero. A realidade aumentada já foi referida aqui nos posts Mundos Virtuais, Realidade Aumentada e Virtualidade Aumentada e Realidade Aumentada. O Horizon Report de 2011 aponta esta tecnologia como uma das mais promissoras, a médio prazo, para aplicação no sector da Educação. As cerimónias que evocam os acontecimentos de 11 de Setembro de 2011 iniciam-se às 13h40 (08h40 em Nova Iorque).

by ruparajgo | Create your own Cartoon at www.toondoo.com This post is for the benefit of fresh Instructional Designers who want to learn about scenario based e-learning courses. To begin with let me try and explain what a scenario based e-learning course is. Scenario based e-learning courses use real life situations to teach the subject. Using real life scenarios heightens the relevance of the e-learning course  simply because the focus is more on application than plain theory. Scenario based approach is very effective especially in soft skill training. This approach is also used in software training. In a scenario based e-learning course the learner is presented with real life situations and is prompted to respond to the situation and in the process he/ she learns. Scenario based courses are highly engaging and interactive. It requires the learner to be an active participant in the learning process. So if the learner is taking the course seriously he/she cannot switch his/her mind off  from what is being taught. Here is an example of a scenario based course on fraud detection.   This is a good example for branching scenrio. This is called branching scenario because all the scenarios are interlinked and essentially part of a single story. The learner responds to one situation and his/her response leads to the next  situation and so on. Branching scenario is essentially a chain reaction. You also have e-learning courses that show scenarios that are not essentially interlinked and very discrete. For example in an e-learning course on customer service training for call centre employees the learner is put in different situations and is prompted to respond. Scenario A might have a situation where a customer is complaining about his problem not yet resolved and the learner is asked to choose a response. Scenario B might have a situation where a customer is requesting for some information and the learner is asked to choose a response. The learner gets feedback for his/her response for each scenario which is not necessarily linked. You can find some more examples of scenario based training here. Scenario based e-learning courses work well with learners. At the same time for an Instructional Designer,  it is highly challenging to create an effective scenario based e-learning course. I shall take up this topic in my next post. Meanwhile if you want to share anything about scenario based e-learning course please feel free to post them in the comments section. Some questions to help you get started: Have you create a scenario based e-learning course? What are the major challenges in creating a scenario based e-learning course? Are there any pain points? You have any good examples of scenario based course?

A plataforma escolinhas (schooools, na sua versão internacional) foi notícia no jornal chileno El Mercurio (17 de Julho de 2011), a propósito da participação deste projecto no programa Startup Chile. O escolinhas é uma rede social que se constitui numa plataforma colaborativa para comunicação e partilha entre alunos, pais e professores do ensino básico. Ver também este post.

Building effective scenarios is a major challenge in designing a scenario based e-learning course. The challenge lies in building scenarios that are: Realistic ( Based on day to day activities of the learners) Relevant (Learners must be able to relate to the scenarios) Precise ( Scenarios cannot be long winding) Sensible ( Scenarios must have depth) Cater to the Learning Objectives ( Scenarios must be based on the learning objectives defined) Consider you have to create a scenario based Course on Leadership skills. Let’s say the SME has given you all the information he/she has on the subject in pdf format. This is what you discover after evaluating the content: You find the content unstructured and scattered You feel the information presented is not learner centric You find the example and the scenarios given in the pdf  is not enough or too simple You find lot of missing information Now you wonder how do you build scenarios using the such information. Here are some tips to handle this kind of a situation. Internalise the Information Given a situation as I mentioned before, you cannot just work with the content superficially. You need to think beyond the given content. You need to internalize the subject. You need understand the essence of the information you are going to deal with. Think From the Perspective of the Learner When you are evaluating the content or structuring the content, always think from the learners’ point of view. Think in terms of usefulness of the information and how the learner will be able to put the information to practical use. This will help you get an idea about the scenarios that you are going to build for the course. There is a marked differnce between listing  the benefits of a product and specifying how the product can be used by the person. Specifying  how someone can use the product is more relevant to the customer than simply listing the benefits. The bottomline is never miss out on the learners’ point of view. Read Up on the Subject and the Context It gets very important for you to get a good understanding about the subject and the context you are dealing with. If the course is about leadership, apart from getting yourself familiar with leadership concepts, you need to find out information about the relevant industry and learner job profiles. If the leadership skills course is for the software industry then you build scenarios based on how things happen in a software company.You fix the leadership skills as it would be relevant for someone in the software industry. Make Best Use of SME Support While working on a scenario based course, you typically interact with the SME continuously. Instead of asking SMEs to give you scenarios, do some research and trying coming up with a basic storyline for the scenario and ask the SME for inputs. This way the SME is assured that you are also taking a lot of interest in the subject and he/she will be interested to help you. It is very important that you understand what kind of information you would need to build the scenarios. So you need to ask the SME the right questions and get the right information.  Discuss Scenarios With Friends and Colleagues You cannot work in seclusion while working on a scenario based course. Most of the time you will not have all the information. So what you do is discuss with people around. This way your source for information is not restricted. You get broader perspectives. Get Scenarios Validated No matter how much you hunt for information, the fact is that you are not an expert in the subject you are dealing with. So always get all the scenarios and information you are going to cover in the course validated by the SME. With this I end the post here and leave it open for discussion. You have more tips to share? Please leave your tips in the Comments section for the benefit of all Instructional Designers who visit this blog

O potencial da Gamification no ensino pode ser ilustrado pelo uso de sistemas de regras e de experiências característicos dos videojogos. Alguns exemplos do que pode ser usado numa sala de aula: Criar desafios adaptados ao nível de conhecimentos do aluno, aumentando a dificuldade desses desafios à medida que o aluno adquire novas competências; Definir vários caminhos para atingir um objectivo com sucesso, permitindo que os alunos escolham objectivos intermédios dentro de uma actividade mais vasta. Definir tarefas pequenas com objectivos facilmente apreendidos, proporcionando feed-back ou uma recompensa imediata que permita evoluir para uma nova tarefa, normalmente de maior grau de dificuldade (a recompensa por resolver um problema é propor a resolução de um problema mais complexo). Considerar o insucesso como parte do processo de aprendizagem. A resolução de uma tarefa pode ser conseguida apenas após diversas tentativas falhadas. Por cada tentativa falhada, o aluno aprende algo que lhe permite ir reformulando a sua estratégia de resolução da tarefa/problema. Nos sistemas de ensino actuais, as oportunidades de por à prova os conhecimentos adquiridos são poucas e as consequências de falhar são importantes. Os alunos só obtêm retorno do seu esforço ao fim de bastante tempo. Tudo isto gera ansiedade. Nos jogos porém, as oportunidades são muitas, as consequências de um insucesso são poucas e o retorno é imediato. Isto motiva os alunos a irem executando pequenas tarefas e a evoluir para tarefas sucessivamente mais exigentes. Possibilitar, num ambiente de gamification, que os alunos possam assumir outras identidades e desempenhar papéis diferentes permitindo explorar outros aspectos da personalidade de cada um num ambiente controlado. Permitir o reconhecimento por parte dos pares ou dos seus professores dos pequenos sucessos e da evolução de cada um promove o aumento do estatuto social. Os professores e os colegas podem ainda recompensar esses sucessos (com o tipo de troféus adequado ao contexto). (ver também o post de Karl Kapp, In Defense of the Term "Gamification" as used by Learning Professionals). Referências:  Gee, J. P. (2007). What Vídeo Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy, Revised and Updated Edition, Palgrave Macmillan. Joey J. Lee, J,, Hammer, J. (2011), Gamification in Education: What, How, Why Bother?   Raymer, R. (2011). Gamification: Using Game Mechanics to Enhance eLearning

by ruparajgo | Create your own Cartoon at www.toondoo.com Hi all, I strongly believe that playing lots of games helps you design better e-learning courses. Games give you ideas on how to : Visualize Design interactive strategies Engage and entertain the audience Set measurable goals and objectives Guide the audience to achieve the goal Well, the list goes on and on. Now that games have so much value, why not play a game every week. Starting this week, every friday, you will find an online game waiting for you in this blog.  All that you have to do is click on the game link and start playing.  Why I chose online games? Well, they are easily accessible, short and fun to play. Have fun! Happy Gaming! regards Rupa

Simon Egenfeldt-Nielsen apresentou, numa palestra na National Conference on Game-Based Learning (Dinamarca, Maio de 2011), os resultados de um inquérito efectuado a professores de um conjunto de países (Dinamarca, Noruega, Finlândia, Portugal e Estados Unidos) relativo ao uso de videojogos nas suas actividades lectivas. Os slides (em PowerPoint) da apresentação, Game-based Learning in Schools - A Teacher Survey,  podem ser descarregados aqui. Desconhece-se o critério de seleção das nacionalidades dos participantes mas destaca-se o facto de terem participado 9 professores portugueses num total de 275 participações. Algumas das principais conclusões:60% dos inquiridos usam videojogos para ensinar; O uso de videojogos foi motivado sobretudo por interesse pessoal e os jogos usados foram escolhidos pelo próprio professor; Os professores inquiridos revelam ainda alguma cautela sobre o uso de videojogos; A maioria considera que o uso de videojogos é uma forma de aumentar o nível de envolvimento dos alunos; Os principais obstáculos ao uso de videojogos estão relacionados com problemas de utilização dos equipamentos informáticos e de instalação de software; O fraco conhecimento dos videojogos por parte dos professores é apontado como a principal razão para a sua não utilização; A maioria dos não utilizadores considera poder vir a usar videojogos no futuro.

Super Stacker 2 is a strategy game. The objective of the game is to stack shapes in such a fashion that they do not fall. The game proceeds in levels and you have different levels of difficulty. At each level you are given some shapes and a hint on the kind of arrangement you should achieve. Using the shapes, you create a stack that stays stable till time runs out. Here is one of the stacks that I successfully created: Things I loved about this game Simple Game Interface The game interface is simple yet appealing . The game controls are simple and you do not get lost on how to play the game. Strategising the solution What is best in this game is that there are no fixed solutions. You actually derive or strategise the best solution depending on the shapes you have and the kind of arrangement you have to achieve. Achieving the goal through trial and error You play each level till you succeed in stacking the shapes in the right manner so that they stay. Every time you fail, you get to know where you went wrong and when you play again you keep the mistake in mind and do better. Creating your own stack You can also create your own stack and share it with their friends and see if they can solve it. Hope you enjoy playing this game as much as I did. Play the game now! Let me know how you liked the game and what appealed you the most

Video de Katie Salen, ligada ao lançamento da escola Quest To Learn em Nova Iorque e diretora do Institute of Play. Neste vídeo aborda a importância do jogos no ensino. A aprendizagem baseada em jogos (Game-Based Learning) promove experiências de aprendizagem e práticas que são consideradas importantes para as competências necessárias para o século XXI. Assim, na perspetiva de Katie Salen, os jogos são importantes porque :Promovem colaboração; Fomentam trabalho em equipa ("team building"); Desenvolvem capacidade de resolver problemas em contextos complexos; Permitem assumir novas identidades; São ambientes onde o risco de falhar é reduzido; Resumo de algumas ideias importantes do vídeo: "Games work in a way that good teachers work.". Good game design = good teaching. Um videojogo ou qualquer outro media digital deve ser visto como mais uma ferramenta a usar pelo professor num determinado processo de ensino, tal como um livro ou conteúdos em linha. O professor deve escolher o meio mais indicado para ensinar determinado conteúdo.  Deve-se deixar de pensar nos jogos como simples entretenimento e analisar o seu potencial pedagógico. As crianças perante um jogo ou perante qualquer media digital assumem muitas vezes o papel de um game designer. O lado social do ensino e importância de cada aluno se sentir parte de uma comunidade é realçado por Katie Salen. É importante que os pais e os professores entrem no mundo dos videojogos, domínio habitual dos mais novos, e partilhem experiências com os seus educandos. Os jogos podem ser a forma dos adultos poderem entrar e participar na cultura digital das gerações mais novas. Katie Salen fala também sobre a avaliação e a validação de conhecimentos adquiridos. Distinguindo entre avaliação sumativa e formativa, defende o papel que os jogos podem ter nesse processo. No contexto de um jogo, o jogador é permanentemente avaliado e recebe feed-back imediato sobre a sua evolução. Como transportar este modelo para a escola é um assunto que Katie Salen investiga. Embora não referindo especificamente (o vídeo é de 2009), as mecânicas de jogos normalmente associadas ao conceito de Gamification, são apontadas como podendo contribuir para novas formas de avaliação.

World Builder from Bruce Branit on Vimeo.

The Scruffs is an Hidden Object Game. In a Hidden Object Game you have to spot hidden objects and solve puzzles or mysteries. In this game The Scruffs, the goal  is to uncover granpa’s secret and help The Srcuffs save their family home. To achieve this goal, you have to search the house for objects listed in grandpa’s notebook. Despite rich visuals and lot of work for your brain, Hidden Object Games can be monotonous. You might get fed up looking for things in a huge mess and simply clicking on the screen. I havent played Hidden Object Games for a long time because they get too boring. Surprisingly, The Scruffs is not boring at all. It is enjoyable and worth a play. Things I liked About This Game The Game Introduction I liked the game introduction because it is short and simple. The game introduction runs like a short cartoon movie. What appealed me most is the use of humour in the introduction. The Hints Section In all Hidden Object Games, you get hints which you can use whenever you want to find the hidden objects. I like the way the hints section has been designed in this game. You get three hints in this game. The three hints are indicated by the three bones. There is a dog sleeping on the right hand side corner. When you click on the dog, he eats the bone and is ready to help you. When you move your mouse across the screen, he gets excited when you get close to the object, thereby helping you find the object. After you exhaust the three hints and when you click on the dog he shows a Do Not Disturb sign. Such strategies are humourous and appealing. The Use of Mini Games To Break Monotony What is interesting in this game, is the use of mini games to break monotony. For example, one of the objects in grandpa’s notebook is Family Photo. When you click on the Family Photo, a  mini game is announced. In this mini game, you have to click on every new scribble that appears on the photo. You must not click on an old scribble. If you do the game ends. Well this is a welcome break from just clicking on the hidden objects. You have a puzzle game also that breaks monotony at the right moment. I like the way mini games have been integrated to go with the flow of the main game. Hope you enjoy playing this game as much as I did. Please note that the online version is a trial version. The Scruffs Uncover Grandpa’s secret and help The Scruffs save their family home.           Play this free game now!!

Entrevista à Professora Lynn Alves sobre o uso de jogos na educação. Mais uma posição a defender o uso de Game-Based Learning. Na entrevista é destacada a importância de pais e professores se envolverem e participarem, junto com os seus educandos, no mundo dos videojogos. Uma opinião semelhante à de Katie Salen (ver este post). Os jogos comerciais são defendidos como possuindo também potencial pedagógico.  Esta visão, de usar jogos comerciais, encaixa numa das três abordagens ao Game-Based Learning que, no essencial, têm sido aquelas que são adoptadas pelas escolas (ver Digital Game Based Learning: It’s Not Just the Digital Native Who Are Restless):Usar videojogos comerciais (COTS - Commercial Off-The-Shelf games), tirando partido da existência de conteúdos que possam ser usados para fins pedagógicos (learning through computer games). Nem todos os vídeojogos têm o mesmo potencial pedagógico havendo muitos em que é discutível a existência de qualquer valor pedagógico. No entanto, de uma forma geral, todos permitem desenvolver competencias de literacia digital, capacidade de resolver problemas e aumento da destreza manual e acuidade visual. Usar Serious Games, videojogos desenvolvidos com propósitos não lúdicos e com fins bem determinados (learning with computer games). Os Serious Games, no entanto, enfrentam a concorrência dos jogos comerciais, não podendo competir com os orçamentos elevados que estes jogos actualmente implicam. Os alunos constroem os seus próprios jogos (usando plataformas como o Scracth) permitindo o desenvolvimento da capacidade de resolução de problemas e competências de programação e de game design (learning by building computer games). Esta abordagem implica que os professores possuam também competências de programação e de game design, o que é certamente uma barreira importante à adoção mais generalizada desta abordagem.  Uma alternativa a estas três abordagens será a aplicação de Gamification: não o uso de jogos mas sim a aplicação das mecânicas de jogos e outros elementos associados a videojogos.

by ruparajgo | Create your own Cartoon at www.toondoo.com  A Linear E-learning Course is the most basic of all kinds of e-learning courses. If you are a budding Instructional Designer, then you must choose to design a Linear E-learning Course first. It is comparatively easy to create a Linear E-learning Course than any other kind of e-learning course because the navigation and flow of this kind of a course are fixed.   In a Linear E-learning Course you go through the course progressively starting with the basics of the subject and then moving on to advance levels. A typical Linear E-learning Course has:  ·     Course Contents : The first slide of the course where you list the course contents. ·     Course Overview : A quick gist of the course and what learners will learn in the course ·     Introduction Sections : Introduction to the subject ·     Pre-tests: Quick tests to check how much the learners know about the subject ·     Post-tests: Tests to check how much the learners have learnt ·     Text and Images: Usually static or animated text appears on the left side with relevant images on the right side of the screen ·     Text Animations : Blocks of text or text with bullet points appear one after the other ·     Basic Interactivity: Drag and drop ,roll over text and mouse clicks ·     Assessments: Multiple Choice Questions ·     Locked Navigation: Back and Next buttons to navigate. Only when the learner completes module 1, he/she can access the subsequent module.  Here is an example of a Linear E-learning Course: I have never liked linear e-learning courses because they get too boring. I always feel linear e-learning courses are digitized versions of text books. But then over a period of time I also realized that linear e-learning course need not be boring. Here are some articles by Tom Kulhmann where he illustrates how linear e-learning courses can be made interesting: Click & Read E-learning Courses Don’t Need to Be Boring Here’s How You Can Save Your Training Job in this Economy Here’s Why Unlocking Your Course Navigation Will Create Better Learning You have something to share about Linear E-learning Courses, please share your views, links to demos or articles in the comments sections.